[Reythan]

Hey all,

I first wanted to thank this community for all of their hard work.

I just started playing space sims not too long ago and I have been having a lot of fun in this genre, but none have come close to the story and lore told in Freespace which is something that keeps me engaged playing despite how a game looks.

After beating the game in steam I found out about the modding community behind this game and I have been super impressed. I decided I would like to give back by creating a mod that makes the game feel a bit more immersive, provides omni directional movement, and gliding. I am a bit of noob to this modding community so if there is anything blatantly wrong let me know, but I would love any opinions you may have as I continue to put this together.

My goal is to give each flyable ship in FS2 a unique cockpit that is also useable (meaning you can see what's going on around you without the model obstructing your view too much). I also want to give each ship omnidirectional movement and gliding, but also keep the ships balanced/true to the original design. I hope to do the same for FS1 and Blue Planet in the future.

Current ships with Cockpits: GTF Ulysses, and GTF Hercules Mark II

Current ships with thrust/glide mod: GTF Ulysses, GTF Hercules, GTF Hercules Mark II, GTF Ares, GTF Erinyes, GTF Loki, GTF Pegasus, GTF Perseus, GTF Myrmidon, GTB Artemis, GTB Artemis D.H., GTB Medusa, GTB Ursa, GTB Zeus, GTB Boanerges, GVF Seth, GVF Horus, GVF Thoth, GVF Serapis, GVF Tauret, GVB Sekhmet, GVB Bakha, GVF Ptah

The Mod is up on Knossos (Title: FS2 Cockpits, Thrust, and Glide Mod) for you to try it out. If you have any suggestions please let me know and I'll try and implement for the next update which will be regularly until I can get through all the ships. Once I have done enough bug squashing I plan on releasing a guide on how I did this.

https://fsnebula.org/mod/fs2_cp_th_gl

[Iain Baker]

Superb! I always felt FS needed something like this. :-)

[Reythan]

Thank you!

I’ll be working on the vasudan ships as well so if you see any improvements that can be made let me know.


I also realized I forgot to include reverse afterburners so I will be working on that too.

Edit: Added Vasudan Cockpit, lateral/vertical/reverse thrust for them, and added reverse afterburners for all modded ships

[Iain Baker]

Could these be made to work with other non-BP campaigns too? If I had my way all campaigns would have these 😎

Would you be able to create a guide that shows how you did it so players and mod creators alike could do likewise? If so I would be extremely greatfull (as would lots of other players too I imagine) 😊👍 (NB a guide to changing the flight mechanics alone would be useful too. I’m thinking these mechanics could be applied to other user made ships, FS1 ships etc.

[Reythan]

I don't see why not since it seems the retail game engine has the functions built in as far as thrusters go.

The bigger question would be if the ships you want to use this on have cockpits built into them. Luckily this community thought ahead and whoever remodeled these ships had the foresight to build in cockpits to look at. I can't speak for other campaigns. I am contemplating CADing up or whatever software is used  to make models (just discovered SCP last week so I need to keep reading on these forums to see what architecture is preferred) 4 or 5 cockpit types that have the gauges built into them, but still true to the designs of the ships, to make them more realistic for FS2 as well with BP. Modelers can then take the cockpit model they like and place into whatever fighter/bomber they are making for any ship.

As for a guide on how to do this, I think I can attempt to do so. I come from the world of Assetto Corsa so I am not sure if there are strict rules on guides here. I know moderators take information posted on their forums seriously, and since I am not familiar with FSO modding I don't want to mislead anyone or have it break an install somehow.

It will be awhile if I do (a week and some change) since I will be busy with other things soon.

I didn't realize there was an FS1 port. Looks like I will be playing through that and modding as I go. Thank you for that!

[Iain Baker]

Awesome, thank you.

Small request - the current cockpit mod on Knossos prevents you from seeing backwards. If you look back - for example, with the 'hat' on a joystick - all you see is the headrest of the pilot's chair. If there is any way around this it would be great. One possible workaround would be to make the rear view transparent so you can see through the ship. Apparently, this is what the helmet used on the F35 does now - the pilot can even look down through the plane!? What the pilot sees is an overlay or similar taken from the cameras. If we can do it now I'm pretty sure we can still do it in 23XX 

In fact, if the whole cockpit was transparent, this would work nicely with head tracking software such as TrakIR5. The degree of transparency could perhaps be something that could set s an option?

Just a thought, and keep up the good work 

[Reythan]

Thanks. I’ll keep this in mind. My alpha version did just that but I had some issues with compatibility across all ships without removing the entire hull. Which then defeated the purpose of free look and took away from immersion.

I’m exploring workarounds by utilizing multiple eyepoints around the ship and binding the views to them. I actually took that idea from the F35 and Apache HUDs on how they connect to image sensors across the air-frame. So we are thinking along the same lines.

The problem I have is that freelook only binds to one eyepoint (maybe I can write a script to bypass this but I’m still exploring the library of functions on SCP to see what is possible, if you know of something let me know) so the views and free look will be different.

The next version I put out will fix this problem since in some ships left right and up view just show you a wall as well.

Any other opinions let me know. My days off will be this. So whatever is priority for the community I will work on.

[Colonol Dekker]

Hell of an introduction.   
Thanks for your efforts bud.

[Reythan]

Thank you.

Just updated so that all the ships I modded have reverse afterburners (looks pretty cool since you can see the flame tails). I will be trying to figure out the pilot views today before I have to put this down for a bit.

If you come across anything wrong or have any more suggestions let me know.

[Reythan]

In fact, if the whole cockpit was transparent, this would work nicely with head tracking software such as TrakIR5. The degree of transparency could perhaps be something that could set s an option?

Gave this a shot while I am learning the functions built into scripting and how I can bind views to separate eye points. Coming from the world of racing sims we have access to multiple cameras. It seems things are a bit more rigid here in terms of camera definitions (or views). It could just be my interpretation of functionality so I could very well be wrong. Still learning my way around the wiki and forums here. You guys document very well.

Anyways tell me if this is what you were thinking. It is only implemented on the Perseus right now. If it's something desirable I'll consider expending effort to do it across the range or at least write a script to do it for me.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Y2hOjZmznKTEmp3E9jcZ8xaG3yRgVufs/view?usp=sharing

[Iain Baker]

Awesome, I’ll check it out tomorrow. But at the risk of sounding stupid, how do I install/use it?

[Reythan]

All you need to do is create a folder in your Knossos/FS2 directory call it whatever you would like and place the VP file inside.

In Knossos go to blue planet complete’s details and you can click on FSO Settings and add the custom flag -mod nameoffolder and you should be good I also like to use -fov 1.0 to widen the field of view

I have not implemented custom gauges and textures yet I am working on that now

The Perseus is the only transparent model

[Iain Baker]

Hi There.

Gave it a try. looking good so far, but I couldn't get the transparency for the Perseus to work, but I might have done something wrong? How should I install it? I tried putting it into the same folder as the cockpits mod but that didn't work, so I created a separate folder and added another -mod XXXXX folder and added that to the FSO settings, but that didn't work either. Does FSO/knossos recognise having multiple -mod XXXXXs in its command line thingy?

One more thing I would suggest adding to all ships is the 'glide' function as this can be used in many situations instead of lateral / verticle thrust and is a little easier to use for those playing with joysticks (it's only on button press/toggle)

May I make a small request? Could you create a version(s) of these with just the enhanced flight mechanics but not the cockpits? Or show how us how we can do this for ourselves? Cheers :-)

[Reythan]

Went ahead and uploaded the mod to knossos to make it easier to test out.

To add just the mechanics yourself you just need to adjust/make a table that applies the option to each ship for example

#Ship Classes

;======>>TERRANS<<=======
$Name:                          GTF Ulysses
+nocreate
$Max Velocity:                   70.0, 70.0, 70.0
$Rotation time:                  3.0, 2.6, 5.0
$Rear Velocity:                  70.0
$Forward accel:                    2.0
$Forward decel:               1.5
$Slide accel:                    2.0
$Slide decel:                    1.5
$Glide:            YES
$Afterburner:                      YES
   +Aburn Max Vel:          150.0, 150.0, 150.0
   +Aburn For accel:             0.7
   +Aburn Max Reverse Vel:      150.0
   +Aburn Rev accel:         0.7
   +Aburn Fuel:                          300.0
   +Aburn Burn Rate:             50.0
   +Aburn Rec Rate:              25.0
#End

Would give the ulysses glide and thrust in all directions. You would then have to do this for every ship. If you do not want to make your own tbm, you could always adjust the .tbm/.tbl files that are used for the game though I typically stay away from that as not to mess up the base game. I plan on making a guide that explains in more detail once I make sure everything works across the board.

[Iain Baker]

Hi there. Did you post a video showing this in action? I can't find it now. I liked the transparent one better, even better if it also had the 'hole' in the headrest to see backwards clearly.

PS - I can't see it on Knossos unless I overlooked it (there are so many on there now it is easily done.) What did you call it?

[Reythan]

I must have removed the link when I modified the post. Here it is again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7nkhQ_wSBA&t=11s

The mod is called FS2 Cockpits, Thrust, and Glide Mod

I modified the very first post I made to reflect.

This is the link from knossos

https://fsnebula.org/mod/fs2_cp_th_gl

Only ships with cockpits are ulysses and herc 2 all the others have the thrust and glide mod applied

The transparency is a bit trickier to get right since I can't apply it locally, it's applied to the entire texture but I can give it another go and see how it comes out. Just need to settle in on an approach and then begin modeling for the rest of the ships.

[Iain Baker]

Superb! Having now rewatched the video on a big screen I can say:

Flight mechanics look superb!

The open cockpit looks good but the rear view looks kinda odd. Also it looked like there was a big hole in the floor of the cockpit between the pilots legs.

The transparent one looks better, although I couldn’t see the targeted ship in the viewer thingy.

Are the cockpits compatible with this? https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=95180.0

And the HD hud icons?

If getting the cockpits to look right proves to be too much of a headache then perhaps release the flight mechanics as a separate addon / mod as this is arguably what would have the greatest positive impact on gameplay. Outstanding work BTW, IMO this is exactly what FS should have had back in ‘98 😎👍

[Reythan]

Thank you!

For the wingmen and HD Icons I can make them compatible with those mods.

Getting the cockpits to look right is not a headache just want to take the best approach.

As for the thrust mod I can drop the tbm file here but is there a better place that people would have easier access to it?

I also figured out local transparency that is not difficult. Check out my updated Ulysses and Herc 2 cockpits and let me know if this strikes better the balance of immersion, but practicality of viewing all around you clearly.

https://youtu.be/cboZNFKyb8w

[Iain Baker]

Re where to place the thrust tables. How about making two separate mods on Knossos. One for the flight mechanics, one for the cockpits, then mod creators can set either or both as dependencies as they see fit? This raises a good point in general, where should files that are not specifically mods ‘live’ where they can be easily found. I’ll ask around.

As for the cockpits - not sure. Getting cockpits to work right in FS has always been a pain I think, probably because retail FS wasn’t set up for it. The BSG themed mods do a good job with a fairly minimalist cockpit, but they have the advantage of only having a few ship classes to model.

https://youtu.be/KFQ8AfibsVc


Metal destroyer’s videos show lots of cockpit mods from a while back.  I think they are part of HLP so they might be worth chatting to.

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL871C571E7A6BF290

Just stumbled upon this too. Might prove handy if you haven’t seen it already. https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=71151.0

[Iain Baker]

Just gave the knossos version a go. Absolutely superb!

Quick question, if the flight mechanics mod has ships in its table(?) that a campaign doesn't, will that cause a problem? I'm guessing not since FS2 doesn't have the BP ships in it and it worked fine - or did you take the BP ships out of the one on knossos? I ask, as I can see myself creating a file that adds EVERY playable ship in every campaign including those that make heavy use of non-retail ships - Exile, Shadow Genesis, Reunion, etc etc. which I can point any campaign to, since I really can't see myself playing any FS campaign without this now